What Are You Thinking?
by pursuit-of-lifes-puzzles
Summary: Jacob starts hearing what other people are thinking - is he special or just insane? sorry but i couldn't find the right category - sorry, if this upsets anyone!


Jacob hears voices

ID number: 0185968

**English Creative Task**

_What are you thinking?_

_June._

"Jacob? Can you please name the capital of India?" asked Mr Johnson, looking smugly at me from across the room. He had noticed that I wasn't paying attention to his lecture on the importance of Geography.

"Um, no sir," I said meekly as the entire class turned to look at me. I felt my cheeks flush bright red.

I heard one of the boys next to me call me stupid and muttered something about the teacher raving on about India and it's capital New Delhi for the past half hour. I scowled at the boy but Mr Johnson didn't seem to hear the comment.

"Pay attention next time, Jacob," he said darkly. "Or there _will_ be a detention in store for you."

A girl to my left laughed at me. I spun around to glare at her but she was looking out the window now, clearly not interested anymore. I clenched my fists. What was with the teacher today? He usually yelled at anyone who so much as sneezed.

As Mr Johnson wrote some notes up on the whiteboard he complained about teaching the year 10 students in our public school who had no potential and were probably going to end up being drug dealers, with or without the geographical knowledge that he was dishing out. I heard his voice but I couldn't see his mouth moving. What was happening? Could I hear his thoughts?

"Sir, I've got potential," I said standing up. I wasn't going to let him insult me, even if he was just thinking it.

"What? Do you have something to share with the class, Jacob?" I saw his eye twitch.

"I'm not going to end up as a drug dealer."

"Sit down, Jacob. You're disrupting the class."

"But Sir!"

"If you don't want to go to the principal's office I suggest that you sit down!" he yelled, peppering the unfortunate front row with spit.

Resentfully, I did as he said.

When I got home I stormed through the house, only stopping when I was in my room and I had slammed the door shut.

"Are you ok?" called Mum from the other side of the door.

"I'm fine!" I yelled. I heard her retreat into the lounge room after a few seconds of hesitation.

I punched my pillow over and over again, stupid teacher! Why didn't he tell off any of the other people who were talking? Or had I been hearing their thoughts too?

My older sister Emily tapped quietly on my door. "Jacob?"

I sighed. She was the one person who I could never be mad with. "Yeah?"

Emily came into my room and sat on my bed next to me, picking up on my mood easily. "What's up?"

"One of my teachers just loves to pick on me but other people were talking, I think, but he just ignored them. Then he was thinking about how I was going to end up a drug dealer."

She looked taken aback. "_Thinking_? Jacob, are you alright?" she asked quietly. She gently pushed the hair away from my eyes and held my chin, making me look at her.

I pulled my head away. "I'm fine! Why does everyone keep asking me that?"

Emily looked pained. "I care for you, you're my little brother and I'll always be looking out for you." She reached for my hand.

I let her take it but made no response when she squeezed it gently.

Later, I watched unnoticed in the doorway as Emily joined my mother on the couch. I studied their mouths moving and their expressions changing.

I sat with my arms crossed across my chest. Dr. Hyde, the psychiatrist, was speaking to my mother in a low voice on the other side of the room so I had to strain my ears to hear what they were saying.

"Now, Mrs Matthews, just so you understand what we're dealing with, people who have schizophrenia will experience psychotic episodes including hallucinations and delusions. The most common hallucination is hearing voices that no one else can hear." Dr. Hyde passed her a tissue as tears spilled down her crumpled face.

"Can you cure him?" she asked trying to compose herself.

"There is no cure for schizophrenia, we can only control the symptoms with medication."

I saw my mother's shoulders sag and she dropped her head into her hands. "My poor boy," she cried as loud sobs escaped her lips.

Why were they trying to give me medication for schizophrenia? People with that were crazy and it was all in their head, what they had wasn't real. _I_ wasn't crazy and I could _definitely_ hear people's thoughts.

_July._

"So, how are you Jacob?" asked the psychologist that I had to see every week.

"I'm fine."

"I mean, how is you condition going?" he asked patiently.

"Oh, um, great. No more voices," I said in the most excited voice I could muster. I rapped my knuckles on the side of my head. "No one here but me." I added with a big cheesy grin.

_August._

Emily walked into my room holding a broken pair of scissors in her hands. "Jacob? Mind if I borrow a pair of scissors?" she said as she riffled around in my desk drawers. "Mine kinda died."

"Sure," I said from under the covers of my bed where I was still half asleep. I heard her sifting through my drawers for a while longer.

"Thanks," she said finally. That single word sounded different to the way she had been speaking when she had come into my room. Anxious? Worried? Afraid? But _why_?

As Emily walked out of the room clutching a small plastic box she opened it again, just to be sure that she wasn't mistaken. No, there was no mistake. In the box was two month's worth of little red pills. The voices had never really left.

**DRAFT PLAN:**

_Rough Plan:_

Jacob hears voices - the thoughts of other people at school

Sister finds out and tries to help

Gets him to go and see someone

Doesn't believe them

Thinks that he really can hear the voices of other people so doesn't take his medication

Pretends to take it

Sister accidentally finds out where he's been putting all of the pills he hasn't been taking

When I write a story I often write bits and pieces that I will use from throughout the story then I join them up.

_Some of the first pieces that I wrote:_

"Jacob? Can you please name the capital of India?" asked Mr Johnson, looking smugly at me from across the room. He had noticed that I wasn't paying attention to his lecture on the importance of Geography.

"Um, no sir." I said meekly as the entire class turned to look at me. I felt my cheeks flush bright red.

I heard one of the boys next to me call me stupid and muttered something about the teacher raving on about India and it's capital New Delhi for the past half hour, I scowled at the boy but Mr Johnson didn't seem to hear the comment.

Emily sat on my bed next to me.

"Jacob? Are you alright?" she asked quietly. She gently pushed the hair away from my eyes and held my chin, making me look at her.

I pulled my head away. "I'm fine! Why does every need to keep asking me that?"

Emily looked pained. "I care for you, you're my little brother and I'll always be looking out for you." She reached for my hand.

I sat with my arms crossed across my chest. Dr. Hyde was speaking to my mother in a low voice on the other side of the room so I had to strain my ears to hear what they were saying.

"Now Mrs Matthews, just so you understand what we're dealing with, people who have schizophrenia will experience psychotic episodes including hallucinations and delusions. The most common hallucination is hearing voices that no one else can hear." Dr. Hyde passed her a tissue as tears spilled down her crumpled face.

"Can you cure him?" She asked trying to compose herself.

"There is no cure for Schizophrenia, we can only control the symptoms with medication."

I saw my mother's shoulders sag and she dropped her head into her hands. "My poor boy." She cried as loud sobs escaped her lips.

Where I got the information about schizophrenia:

Unknown (Wikipedia). (2008, 7 August). Schizophrenia. Available en./wiki/Schizophrenia. Online.

Unknown (Medicine Net). (2008). Schizophrenia. Available /schizophrenia/article.html. Online.

**RATIONAL:**

I got the idea for this creative task from a book that read over the holidays, King of the Pygmies by Jonathon Scott Fuqua, it is also about a young boy who begins to hear voices but unlike in my creative task the main character, Penn, does not receive treatment of any kind.

In this task I tried to convey the struggle that people with schizophrenia face, in the way that many people with schizophrenia don't know what is real and what is delusion or hallucination. Due to his condition Jacob believes that he is hearing the thoughts of other people and does not see that this conclusion is impossible. He refuses to take the medication because, like so many people with this mental illness, he doesn't think that he has schizophrenia and that his hallucinations are real.

While I was writing this story I tried to incorporate the differences in perspective of the characters. How Jacob believes he can hear the thoughts of people around him, while his older sister and his mother very clearly know that these voices are nothing more than part of a serious mental illness.


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